


living in the real world (ain't it fun)

by teacupfulofbrains



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: (you'll see), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Suddenly Human!AU, all of the feels, all relationships are completely platonic, and she repays him by manifesting his sides, and then he has to deal with the fallout of that, but only in regards to logan and virgil, featuring SEVERAL HEADCANONS about the sides, frank discussions of anxiety, gratuitous application of headcanons, gratuitous hurt/comfort shenanigans, heartfelt apologies, long overdue heartfelt conversations, technically a kidfic, thomas is nine THOUSAND percent done with ALL of the shenanigans, thomas saves a witch
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-09
Updated: 2018-11-22
Packaged: 2019-06-24 11:59:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15630249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teacupfulofbrains/pseuds/teacupfulofbrains
Summary: Thomas Sanders doesn't understand a lot of what goes on inside his head. He just wants a little less cognitive dissonance and a better understanding of his thought processes, although he doesn't think he's ever going to get it. Then he helps a woman who's being harangued in a bar, and the next thing he knows, he's waking up with clones of himself in his bedroom and EVEN MORE cognitive dissonance.Well, at least they're entertaining, right?(OR: Thomas has his sides suddenly and permanently manifested in order to assist with his problems. It goes about as well as you'd expect at first, but against all odds, good things do happen.)





	1. chapter the first

**Author's Note:**

> new project? new project. 
> 
> HUGE thanks to EVERYONE in the inner sanctum for supporting me while i hashed this idea out! i'm really excited and i'm super proud of it and very very happy to show it off!!! 
> 
> tw will be on each individual chapter!! please enjoy!!
> 
> ch 1 tw: alcohol mention, mentions of harassment, anxiety attack, v brief nsfw mention but nothing explicit

Thomas seriously regrets going out.

He doesn’t usually, and he’s not sure how he ended up in this particular bar, with the music too loud and the strobe lights too bright and the alcohol too strong, but he is having _all_ of the regrets. His heart is singing a furious staccato against his chest, and his drink coats his tongue in heavy slime when he takes a sip.

He hasn’t touched it since that one sip, but he still decides to wait the cursory hour before he attempts to go home. Secretly, he hopes that he’ll acclimatize to the bar in that time, gather the courage to go and ask a cute boy for his number, but realistically, he knows that’s not happening. He’s just not good at this sort of thing – his anxiety runs away with the show. It doesn’t stop him from hoping, though.

(He wonders if maybe it should. The cognitive dissonance is going to kill him one of these days.)  
  
Honestly, Thomas isn’t sure how he hears the commotion, especially considering the _entire room_ is one big commotion, but his gaze is drawn towards the bar, and he sees a young woman, leaning back on one elbow. She’s wearing a sleeveless, burnt orange dress that compliments her warm skin, dark braids piled elegantly on top of her head, simple yet tasteful gold jewelry around her neck and wrists. She’s sipping her drink in a slow, unhurried manner, and even though Thomas is, quite possibly, one of the gayest humans to ever exist, he cannot deny the pure physical aesthetics of this woman.

He doesn’t appear to be the only one who’s noticed, unfortunately. No fewer than three men crowd around her, leaning into her personal space and pressing what must be uncomfortably close to her. One of them is smoking, and basically blowing the smoke straight into her face. She wrinkles her nose in disgust and wafts the smoke away with her hand, but they just don’t take the hint.

Thomas doesn’t know what possesses him, but suddenly he’s on his feet, making sure he has his jacket and his keys and his wallet and his phone (and his drink, for some reason) before he crosses the bar. He slips between two of the men, hops up on an open barstool, and slides his arm around the woman, careful to keep his hand on her arm, near her elbow, and not touch anywhere inappropriate.

“Hey, there,” he drawls, trying to pour attraction into his voice. “Sorry I took so long to come back. Can my _girlfriend_ and I help you gentlemen with something?” Her eyes widen next to him, but only barely; the men in front of them don’t seem to notice, although judging by the stench of alcohol they probably aren’t noticing much right now. She seems happy enough to play along, anyway, giggling flirtatiously and leaning into him, resting her head on his shoulder without disturbing her carefully-piled hair. 

“She’s with _you_?” one of the men says, looking Thomas up and down with disgusted disbelief. “Really? You’re settling for this beanpole?”  
  
“At least I know better than to blow smoke into someone’s face,” Thomas retorts, and his knees are shaking but he hopes that’s hidden by his forced-casual position, one leg crossed over the other. “Especially such a beautiful woman.”

The smoking man huffs in exasperation. “Whatever. Come on, this isn’t worth it. I’m sure there are easier fish out there.” 

They leave, and Thomas finally exhales, releasing the breath that’s been trapped in his chest for years, it feels like. He immediately pulls his arm off of the woman’s shoulders like he’s been burned, sets his drink down so forcefully that some spills onto his fingers, and scoots backwards, flinging his hands up palms-out against his chest as she raises one perfect eyebrow at him. 

“Oh my god I am _so sorry_ I – _please_ don’t think that I’m trying to come on to you I’m _not_ I – not that you’re not attractive! You’re very attractive it’s just – I’m a flaming homosexual, like, seriously, I might be _the single gayest human being on the planet_ I wouldn’t be surprised! But no I – you looked really uncomfortable and I thought maybe if I pretended to be your boyfriend they’d get annoyed and leave and it worked! And I’m rambling now oh god I’m so embarrassed but – yeah I just – _not that I think you couldn’t have handled that situation yourself_ but I – um, I, I, um, I –”

He trails off, stuttering, when the woman throws her head back and laughs, full and throaty. “Aren’t you just precious?” she says, voice musical and accented. “I could have handled myself, you are not wrong, but I appreciate your efforts. They are . . . endearing.”  
  
“I’m just glad you’re not angry,” Thomas says. He smiles easily, and the woman smiles back. He notices two pins on her dress (were they there before?) – a trans pride flag and a lesbian pride flag. “One out-and-proud to another, right?” 

“Indeed. And make no mistake, I am grateful. Can I buy you a drink?” she asks him. “As thanks. A gift in return for yours.”  
  
“Oh, no, I – I’m actually going to get going. But I’m glad I could help you! I hope you have a great night!” Thomas hops off the barstool, prepared to head home, but the woman catches his wrist. Her hold is loose, and he could break it easily, but when he turns to meet her gaze he’s suddenly rooted in place. 

“One good deed deserves a repayment in kind,” she says, and her eyes are oddly bright. “Tell me, Thomas Sanders, what is one thing that you truly wish for?” (When did he tell her his name?)

Thomas isn’t sure what prompts him to respond the way he does. His head has gone slightly foggy, and when he talks he barely feels his mouth move. It’s like someone else has dislodged him from the controls and slipped in, and he’s watching his body from the outside. 

“I want to understand myself better. I – I have a lot of trouble making decisions and it – it feels like I’m fighting myself constantly. I wanna be more in tune with myself.”

He has no idea where the words come from, but they aren’t lies. The woman smiles. “An admirable desire,” she muses. “And you have earned a token of my favor this night. Very well, Thomas Sanders. Let it be so.”

She leans forward and presses a single chaste kiss against the center of his forehead, and her lips burn on contact. Instantly, Thomas is seized with a pounding headache, and he curls in on himself to try and ease the pain. Suddenly, he’s losing consciousness, crumpling to the ground, and he’s distantly aware of the woman’s arms around him and her voice in his ear but he’s too far gone to process either properly.

*~*~*~*~*

Thomas wakes up in his own bed, blinking slowly, groaning at the harsh sunshine in his eyes. He pushes himself up slowly. He barely remembers last night – he knows he went out, but . . .

Something stirs next to him, and Thomas stiffens. He hasn’t had a one night stand in a long time, but he’s pretty sure that waking up next to the guy isn’t really standard procedure. He knows this is his bed, so does that give him the right to kick the guy out? He yawns, and then realizes that he’s wearing clothes. He has a t-shirt and boxers on, and from what he can tell they’re both clean.

He seriously doubts there was any actual intercourse last night, but he has no idea.

The lump of blankets still in his bed shifts a little, and tousled brown hair pokes out onto the pillow. Thomas can’t see anything else, so he moves to shake the guy awake. If he’s cute, maybe there’s a morning coffee in their future? 

The guy grumbles and stirs, but doesn’t wriggle his way out of the blankets. “Um . . . Hello? I, uh, you’re in my bed, I – I think we might have had a little too much to drink?”

The other person sits up, blankets pooling down around his waist, and suddenly Thomas isn’t so sure that he isn’t _still_ drunk (did he even drink last night?) because he is currently staring down what is either a secret government clone or a long-lost twin. He dismisses the twin thing instantly – his parents aren’t good enough liars for that to be true – which means this is a clone.

Oh, lord have mercy, _did he fuck his clone last night?_ He seriously doubts it, since there’s no pain when he wiggles his hips, but at this point anything’s fair game. His clone isn’t a perfect copy – he’s more tanned than Thomas is, which is a sticking point, his hair is a lot wavier, there’s a small beauty mark on his face. The clone is also wearing a frankly _ridiculous_ outfit, a white jacket with a red sash and lots of gold trim, as well as some red-and-gold shield logos.

The clone yawns, looks around, seeming confused by his surroundings, and then he looks at Thomas. He’s half-asleep, eyes half-open, but from what Thomas can see they have the same brown eyes, same face shape, same nose and same jaw and same body.

“Pat?” the clone asks, and _oh god that’s his voice_. It’s thick with sleep, slightly hoarse, and a little bit strangely accented, but definitely his. “What are you – wait, where –?” He looks around, focusing on something across the room. Thomas follows, ignoring the anxious terror rapidly welling in the pit of his stomach, and almost has a heart attack. 

There is an armchair in the corner of his bedroom, and usually it plays host to a pile of dirty clothes. It’s currently playing host to what appears to be _another_ clone. This one is dressed a little more sensibly, at least, in jeans and a light blue polo shirt, with something gray tied around his shoulders – a jacket, maybe? He’s wearing glasses, too, for some reason, thick, square black frames dangerously close to sliding off his face as he sprawls in the chair. He’s snoring, pretty loudly by all accounts, and Thomas isn’t sure how he missed that noise before but now it’s impossible to ignore. 

Bed-Clone tears his gaze away from Chair-Clone, and Thomas turns his head in eerie synchronization. He sees another body on the floor – a flash of pale skin against black material, a far-too-familiar face – and then looks at Bed-Clone to see the horror in his gut mirrored in his eyes.

“You’re – you’re – _what the fuck am I doing here_?” Bed-Clone whispers fervently.

Thomas can’t bring himself to speak, heart pounding. Bed-Clone narrows his eyes at Thomas, like he’s trying to figure out who he is, and then they fly open in apparent recognition. This scares Thomas to an unholy degree, as he has never met this person before in his life.

“Oh, god – Thomas, I –”

That’s the last straw. Bed-Clone _knows his name_ , apparently, and shares his face and body and is probably here for some kind of complicated identity theft scam and that’s the end of it for Thomas. He screams, as loudly as he can, and rockets backwards off the bed, collapsing on the floor in a tangle of limbs and blankets. Bed-Clone screams back, startled by the sudden noise. Chair-Clone jerks awake with a snort.

“Who-huh-wha-huh-where?” he says, and then he’s shoving his glasses up and staring. “Kiddo, why are you – where are – _oh_.” He seems exactly as surprised as Bed-Clone, if a little calmer, but what unsettles Thomas is that he has a knowing look in his eyes as though he recognizes not only _Thomas_ but also Bed-Clone. Do all secret government clones of a person know each other? Do people normally have more than one secret government clone?

_Oh god, they’ve sent a team, he is going to **die**. _

Thomas is still screaming when a confused, angry grumble stuns him into silence, and then the body on the floor sits up and there are _three of them now_. Floor-Clone is wearing black slacks, a black polo, and a dark-blue-and-black striped tie. He squints at the bed, at Bed-Clone, like he can’t see anything, and then rasps, “Roman, for the love of all that is holy, _stop screaming_.”

“I stopped screaming a minute ago!” Bed-Clone ( _Roman?_ ) says, in what Thomas thinks is a more offended voice than he has ever managed to pull off in his whole adult life. Floor-Clone nods.

“Ah. My apologies. Patton, _stop screaming_.”

“Not me either, kiddo,” says Chair-Clone ( _Patton?_ ). Floor-Clone turns his head towards the sound instinctively, but still doesn’t appear able to see anything.

“So it is not. Where are my –” 

“On the floor to your left,” Chair-Clone says cheerily, “about . . . nine o’clock?”

Floor-Clone feels around the floor to his left until he fumbles up a pair of black-rimmed glasses that look almost exactly like Chair-Clone’s. He puts them on, blinks a few times, and looks at Chair-Clone. “Good morning, Patton. I was not aware we were having a sleep-over tonight.”

“We weren’t,” Chair-Clone ( _Patton, his name appears to be Patton_ ) says. “Logan, I think you better take a good look around.” Floor-Clone ( _Logan???_ ) looks around the room, and then his eyes settle on Thomas, still stunned on the floor.

“ _Thomas_?”

Thomas detangles himself from the blankets in record time and scrambles to his feet, backing into the corner of his bedroom, chest heaving. “Who are you?!” he demands. “Why do you look like me?! How did you get in here?! Did the government send you to kill me?! Am I drunk or high or hallucinating or all of the above or – what – I – wha –”

He’s hyperventilating pretty badly at this point, and Chair-Clone, who’s been sprawled lengthwise across the chair, sits up properly, looking concerned. “Thomas, kiddo, you have to breathe, okay?” Thomas can barely hear him over the blood rushing in his ears.

Floor-Clone pushes himself to his feet and stalks across the room, and Thomas flattens himself against the wall as best as he can. “Logan, what are you doing?” Bed-Clone demands. “You’re just going to make it worse!” Floor-Clone approaches him, and Thomas can feel anxious tears pricking at his eyes. He reaches a hand out, towards Thomas, and Thomas closes his eyes and braces for impact.

A hand presses against his chest, firm but not painful, fingers spread out. “Thomas, you have to breathe.”

“ _H-how – you – my name –”_

“I promise you that we will explain everything, but you need to breathe first. This heightened state is not good for any of us. Do you remember what you were taught do with your breathing in moments of excessive alarm? 

“ _I – f-four – seven – e-eight –_ ” 

“Yes. That’s good. Would you like me to count for you?” Thomas nods, choking as he tries to inhale, and Floor-Clone begins to tap his index finger against his chest without moving his hand. He counts a slow, quiet, steady pace, and Thomas inhales through his nose and holds and exhales through his mouth. “Yes. You are doing admirably, Thomas. Continue doing what you are doing,” Floor-Clone praises gently. 

Thomas lets his clone talk him through the anxiety attack, in a surprisingly level voice. When he finally regains his breath, he points to Bed-Clone and gets his most pressing question off of his chest. “Did we fuck last night?”

Bed-Clone splutters indignantly, and his face turns as red as his sash. “ _I beg your pardon, Thomas?!_ ” he shrieks.

“Language!” Chair-Clone chides, managing to sound exactly like Thomas’s memories of his dad’s _I’m-not-mad-I’m-just-disappointed_ voice. “Honestly, Thomas!” Thomas isn’t sure how he feels about being scolded by a clone that may or may not be here to kill him.

“Listen, if you’d just woken up in a bed with a stranger, regardless of the fact that they look and sound uncannily like you, you would also want to know if you’d fu – had sex or not!” Thomas argues.

“He’s not wrong,” Floor-Clone says, hand still on Thomas’s chest.

“ _Logan!_ ” Chair-Clone scolds. Floor-Clone brushes it off, seemingly unaffected. 

“ _We most certainly did nothing of the sort!_ ” Bed-Clone says, and he is clearly personally affronted that Thomas would suggest such a thing. Thomas is almost offended – is his clone saying he’s not good enough in bed for him? – before deciding that he has more pressing matters to attend to. 

“Who are you?” he demands. They all open their mouths at once, and he cuts them off before they can start speaking. “Okay, no, bad idea. You.” He points at Floor-Clone, who seems to be the most reasonable of the three. “You answer me. Who are you?” 

Floor-Clone sighs. “My name is Logan.”

“What’s your last name?” 

“I don’t have one.”

“That’s bull, everyone has a last name.” 

“I do not think that is true, but if you insist, my last name is Sanders.”

“That’s – that’s my last name.”  
  
“This is not new information, Thomas. Now then – what do you remember about last night?” 

Thomas thinks back, tugging for hazy memories that linger at the edges of his brain. He remembers getting to the bar, he remembers ordering a drink and disliking it instantly, he remembers waiting it out so he could get home safely. He remembers –

“I . . . I saved a woman. She was getting hit on by a bunch of assholes, so . . . I pretended to be her boyfriend to scare them off. She offered to buy me a drink and . . . and I said no, and then she asked what I wanted and . . .”

“And?” Floor – _Logan_ prompts, gently.

“I said that I . . .” Thomas tries to wrap his head around what he said, but the memories are fuzzy and faint. “I wanted . . .”

Chair-Clone speaks up, and his bubbly voice is serious. “You said you wanted to be more in touch with yourself. That must have been what summoned us. I think you met a witch last night, Thomas.” Thomas barely processes the words because Bed-Clone and Chair-Clone and Logan are all nodding like this makes perfect sense and he is confused.

“Who are you?!” he demands.

Bed-Clone springs to his feet, dramatic as ever, and bows with a flourishing hand gesture. “I am Prince Roman, at your service, Thomas!”

“Roman, you’re not a prince, shut the fuck up,” Logan snaps.

“How _dare_ you?!” Roman gasps, pressing a hand to his chest, apparently personally offended. 

“ _Language!_ ” Chair-Clone says again, leveling a disapproving stare at Logan.

“I am not wrong. Hashtag-I-am-not-wrong.” Thomas doesn’t know what to be more shocked by, Logan’s attempt at a meme or the fact that there’s some kind of royalty in his bedroom.

“Anyway!” Roman snaps, pleased to have drawn Thomas’s attention back to himself. “I am Roman, and I am the physical embodiment of your hopes, dreams, romance, passion, creativity –”

Logan rolls his eyes. “He’s your ego. I am Logan, your logical reasoning, rational thought, and intelligence.” 

“And I’m Patton!” Chair-Clone cheers. “I’m a dad!” 

Thomas is even more confused. “I – wha – _I am my own dad_?!” He likes _Steven Universe_ , but he doesn’t think he’s ready to live the show.

“No, no, h – he’s not your dad,” Logan sighs. “He’s your morality, your sense of right and wrong, your apparent and unbearable fondness for dad jokes. What he is _not_ is anyone’s actual father.”

Thomas is still kind of confused and still kind of afraid. “How do I know any of this is real?” 

Logan pushes his hand into Thomas’s chest a little, and the weight is solid and real. “Does that feel like a dream?” 

“No . . .” 

Thomas peers more closely at Logan. “So, you’re all aspects of me.” 

“Yep!” Patton says.

“So why don’t you all look like exactly like me?”

They all resemble him, to an uncanny degree, but they all have their differences. Patton looks to be 29, the same age as Thomas, but he has bouncy brown curls in place of Thomas’s stick-straight brown hair and laugh lines crinkled around his eyes like Thomas’s father and grandfather. He also seems to be a little softer around the edges than Thomas is, with a pudgier stomach, thicker thighs, fuller cheeks – but on Patton, it just looks natural.

Roman is tanner, with wavier hair, but he’s also more toned. He has more muscle built up than Thomas himself does, and he looks a little younger. Not by much, a few years at most, but it’s still noticeable. Logan, on the other hand – Thomas isn’t sure how he managed to ignore that. Apparently, his anxiety is a lot stronger than he thought. 

Logan is a picture-perfect image of teenage Thomas Sanders – seventeen, if he had to guess, but a young seventeen. His face is round and soft, his hair is a mix of Roman’s waves and Patton’s curls, and he’s shorter than Thomas, too, by a good three or four inches. Logan looks down, taking in his own appearance for the first time, and immediately bolts for a mirror.

“I am a _child_?!” he squeaks, and the dignified, calm façade he’s been clinging to since Thomas met him is blown. “What is – Roman, if this is one of your pranks I am going to _eviscerate you with your own sword!_ ”

“I didn’t even choose to manifest us!” Roman responds. “How can this be my fault?”

“Kiddos, you have to calm down,” Patton soothes, standing off his chair and brushing his shirt off (not that Thomas can see anything on it). “You’re going to upset Thomas.”

“Thomas is already upset,” Thomas says. “Thomas is upset and confused and still not convinced that this isn’t some sort of drug-induced hallucination.”

Patton crosses the room until he’s standing in front of Thomas. “Is this a hallucination, kiddo?” He opens his arms and tugs Thomas into his arms. Distantly, Thomas notes that Patton does it slowly, hand loose around his arm, giving him plenty of opportunity to pull away if he really doesn’t want to be hugged. But he _does_ , so he lets it happen.

It might be the best hug he’s ever received. Patton is warm and solid, and he gives exactly the kind of hug Thomas loves to receive. He snakes one arm under Thomas’s and brings his hand flat against Thomas’s back, sweeping wide, smooth strokes up and down his spine. His other hand cups the back of Thomas’s head and gently guides it to rest on his shoulder. He squeezes with just the right amount of pressure, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet as he rocks them back and forth. 

Thomas wonders if it would be weird to cry. Probably, he decides, but he doesn’t think he will. He inhales, and then he isn’t so sure, because Patton somehow smells like all of his favorite things at once, and each scent is distinctive enough for him to pick out individually while still blending together into a unique scent that Thomas thinks is his new favorite. 

Well, there goes any hopes of not crying.

“I know this is a lot,” Patton says. “But you’re taking it really well. I’m proud of you, kiddo. We’re all confused and scared, but we’re gonna get through this together, okay?” 

Thomas isn’t still confused and afraid and concerned, but Patton is so sincere that he can’t help but feel comforted, even though he can still hear Roman and Logan bickering about Logan’s appearance in the bathroom. 

It’s almost enough to dispel the strange pang of anxious, jealous longing in his heart.


	2. chapter the second

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *rolls up six months late with starbucks* PLEASE ENJOY THIS UPDATE I LOVE YOU ALL 
> 
> tw: anxiety attacks, arguing, brief mentions of physical injury

“So, let me get this straight.”

“Impossible. We’re not straight.” 

Thomas blinks at Roman. “You – _all_ of you are gay?” 

“Thomas, we’re pieces of you. We have the exact same . . . romantic tendencies as you,” Logan explains. For how explosive he seems to be wherever Roman is concerned, Logan has been incredibly patient with Thomas. All three of them have, even though they’re clearly exactly as stressed-out and uncomfortable as he is.

“Okay, so, rephrase: let me get this _gay_ then. You three –” Thomas makes a weird gesture that he hopes encapsulates the sentiment of “whatever-the-fuck-is-going-on-right-here”. Logan raises an eyebrow, Roman tilts his head in confusion, and Patton just smiles.

“You’re all different elements of my personality, given a form and an independent consciousness.”

“Indeed!” Roman exclaims.

“Okay, but . . . I have _so many questions_.”

“Which is to be expected. We promise to answer them to the best of our abilities, Thomas,” Logan reassures. Thomas looks at him again, eyes wide and earnest behind his glasses.

“Are there any more of you?” 

Logan starts to respond, but Roman cuts him off with a flippant hand gesture. “Well, I certainly hope not!” Thomas feels an uneasy anger build in his chest, and it confuses him. 

“What Roman means, kiddo, is that no, we’re not the only sides of your personality that exist in that head of yours!” Patton laughs. “But for the time being, we do appear to be the only ones who’ve manifested in the real world.” 

“And that is a _good thing_ , Thomas, believe me! We three are the core aspects of your personality – we are the most _important_ ones. The others are . . . unsavory, to say the least.”

“What . . . what are you talking about?” 

Roman lowers his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “They’re the _dark sides_ , Thomas!” 

Logan rolls his eyes. “What Roman is _trying_ to say, despite his penchant for unnecessary theatrics, is that the other aspects of your personality are often problematic. All of us act in the way that we think is best for you, but their methods are . . . unorthodox, to put it mildly, and often tend to disrupt your daily life.”

“They mess everything up! Especially _Anxiet_ y,” Roman says, and the sheer derisive disgust with which he says _anxiety_ sends a terrified shiver down Thomas’s spine. “That asshole never lets me do _anything!_ That’s the whole reason that our evening last night was cut short – because _he_ –” 

“Language, Roman,” Patton says. “And be a little nicer to him! He just wants to protect Thomas.” 

“From what, _living his life_? Honestly, I’m glad he’s not here. I hate dealing with him.” 

Thomas feels the weird ball of anger in his chest melt _instantly_. It’s replaced with a cold, quiet feeling that he can’t really identify, but it makes him feel uncomfortable and out of place in his own house. He doesn’t like that feeling, and rather than dwelling on it, he focuses on Logan.

“I’m sure that you have more questions,” Logan prompts gently. “I would be happy to answer them.”

Thomas’s next question is significantly lacking in any sort of tact, but he can’t help blurting it out. “How come they’re adults and you’re not?” 

Logan’s face contorts into a pained grimace. Thomas half-expects the little throbbing angry-vein thing that shows up in B-roll anime to appear on his temple. “Contrary to my physical appearance,” he grinds out, gritting his teeth, “I am twenty-nine years of age, just like you.” 

“But you look like I did when I was in high school.”

“I . . . am aware.” 

“I’m so confused.” 

“Well, maybe it has something to do with when you first started needing us,” Patton muses. 

“ _I didn’t even know you existed until thirty minutes ago!_ ” 

“Not consciously, but we’ve been in your head the whole time! I’ve been around since the very beginning – even little babies have emotions, right?” 

“Y-yeah, I – I guess that makes sense.”

“I first took hold when you were a preschooler,” Roman explains. It’s weird to Thomas to hear his voice coming from Roman – it’s weird from all of them, but Roman is doing some kind of accent thing that’s making it very difficult to focus on the words coming out of his mouth. “You were very imaginative as a child, Thomas! I had a lot of control back then!”

He glares at Logan. “Then the Microsoft Nerd here showed up, and I got kicked out of my spot!”

“Falsehood,” Logan counters. “Even before I had form, I was there within Thomas to an extent. It is not as though I just _materialized_ one day.” 

“Oh, but it is! I woke up one morning and _there you were_ , standing there with your  _glasses_ and your _necktie_ and your _holier-than-thou-I’m-always-right_ attitude and –”

“That’s rich, coming from you, you self-besotted, stuck up, head-in-the-clouds –”

Thomas feels a familiar headache building behind his eyes, pressing at them like they’re going to pop out of his sockets and roll across the floor, hammering at his forehead and temples like the bone is going to shatter and let all of the turmoil inside him come spilling out into the real world. 

As he watches Logan and Roman get increasingly agitated, he considers the possibility that it already has. 

“Kiddos, it’s time to stop now,” Patton says, but neither one of them can hear him. the headache worsens. Thomas drops his head into his hands. There’s a strange feeling building up in his chest – not anger, but exasperation, covering something desperate and needy that’s _begging_ everyone to _stop stop stop stopstopstopstop –_

“ _Stop it!_ ” Thomas snaps, shoving the heels of his palms into his eyes so hard he sees phosphenes dance across the resounding darkness. “ _Stop fighting, stop yelling, just stop it!_ ”

And they do. 

Thomas lifts his head from his hands, startled by the sudden silence, to see Roman and Logan, staring at each other, still angry but silent. Both of their mouths are open, like they were in the middle of saying something, but neither one is making a single sound. 

“I . . . did not expect that to work.”

Logan shuts his mouth (although it looks painful, like he has to force it) and turns away from Roman. “Apologies, Thomas,” he says quietly. “Are you alright?” 

“Y-yeah, but . . . geez, my head is _killing_ me,” he groans. Patton worriedly presses a hand to Thomas’s forehead, like he’s checking for a fever or something. His hands are soft and surprisingly warm. 

“A headache will not be identified or cured like that, Patton,” Logan says.

“Like we need that information right now,” Roman mutters. Logan glares at him. Roman moves his hand like he’s going to flip Logan off, catches the expression on Patton’s face, and reconsiders. 

“Guys, I’m okay, really, I just . . . my head,” Thomas says. “It . . . it hurts. Do you two always fight like that?”   
  
“We get into the occasional argument,” Logan says with a noncommittal shrug. 

“Occasional?” Roman laughs. “We have more arguments than there are days in a year, pocket protector!” Logan bristles at the nickname, snatching a decorative pillow off the bed and hurling it at Roman. The pillow falls onto the ground, neatly halved, as Roman brandishes a sword at Logan. It’s long and shiny and silver, and it looks kind of like a katana. Logan yelps and scrambles backwards. 

Thomas feels an unfamiliar panic spike through his whole system. He wants to curl into a ball and hide, even though he doesn’t _really_ think Roman will stab him. He doesn’t really think Roman will stab Logan, either, for that matter. Still, he feels as though he is going to die – even if Roman doesn’t stab him, the terror welling in his chest will crush his heart to dust. 

“Roman, what the fuck?”   
  
“ _Language!_ ” Patton snaps. “And Roman, kiddo, put the sword away!”

Roman wiggles the sword menacingly at Logan. “Roman, st _op it_!” Logan squeaks, voice cracking in the middle of his sentence. His face is pink, and Thomas winces a little, remembering the visceral embarrassment of his voice doing that in high school. Another spike of anxiety has him doubling over a little, curling slightly into the fetal position and clutching at his chest, right over his heart.

“ _Oh_.”

“Kiddo, _put the sword down_!” Patton reiterates, standing between Logan and Roman with his arms spread out. “You can’t just stab Logan because he said something mean! And _you_ can’t just say mean stuff, Logan!” 

“I didn’t even say anything!” Logan protests, wincing as his voice breaks again. “The pillow couldn’t hurt him anyway!”

“ _Guys, please_ ,” Thomas groans, and all three of them turn instantly. “Just – the sword, it – put it – I –” 

He feels an inexplicable panic surging up in his chest, rapidly flooding all of his senses, constricting his breathing, causing little black spots to dance in his field of vision. Before he can properly focus on trying to stave off his impending panic attack, he feels it start to ebb all on its own.

It doesn’t get far. 

Thomas can faintly feel his chest heaving in large, panicked breaths and faintly hear Patton trying to talk to him and faintly see Logan and Roman watching him with horror and concern smeared equally and identically across their faces, but he can’t focus on any external stimuli. The only thing that he can concentrate on is the strange tug-of-war of panic within his chest as he grows more anxious and then less anxious and then more anxious and then less anxious without any conscious input at all.

Gradually, the panic recedes far enough that he can feel warm hands on his face and hear Patton’s voice, which is shaky despite his calm tone. “Thomas, kiddo, you have to breathe. You’re okay, everything is okay – Roman put his sword away, see? Everything is okay. You just have to breathe, Thomas, can you do that for me? I know Logan was doing some counts for you earlier, do you need him to do those again? Can you hear me, Thomas?”

Thomas manages to lift his head and meet Patton’s eyes, which are exactly the same as his but somehow still wildly different. “There you are,” Patton says, and his tone would be patronizing coming from anyone else, but Thomas can’t process it as anything but comforting. “You’re gonna be just fine, Thomas, okay?” 

He manages a stiff, shaky nod. “Good! That’s good. Do you want me to count the breathing exercise out for you again?” Thomas nods again. “Okay. I’m going to put my hand on your thigh, alright, Thomas? I’m going to put my hand on your thigh and I’m going to tap out the counts, and I want you to breathe with me. Here we go. Are you ready?” 

It hurts, at first, following the breathing exercise. The panic has an icy vise grip around his heart, and his ribs ache every time his chest expands. He’s hyperventilating, he discovers, and apparently has been for a while now, because it’s difficult for him to get enough breath in his chest to make it past the first count of four. He notices Patton wincing when he tries to breathe, but he just keeps counting. “It’s okay, Thomas. Just keep trying, okay kiddo? In for four, here we go. One . . . two . . . three . . . it’s okay, we’ll try again, yeah?”

It takes ten minutes for Thomas to get enough breath to complete one cycle of the breathing exercise, but once he gets that first cycle complete it’s easy to keep going until he’s breathing normally again, uncurling his body and flexing his stiff muscles. “Sorry, he croaks, wincing at how shitty his voice sounds. “I’m – I don’t know what –”

“No harm done, kiddo!” Patton says brightly, if slightly strained. “As long as you’re okay now, right?” 

“Yeah, I’m okay.” Thomas looks at Logan and Roman. Roman’s sword is nowhere to be seen, but he looks absolutely distraught. “Roman, I –” 

“ _I am so sorry, Thomas!_ ” Roman wails. “I – I truly did not intend to cause you distress, especially not such a severe level! My sword is intended only to protect you, _never_ to harm you! I – I’m so – I’m _sorry_ , Thomas, I didn’t – I never meant to – I – I’m _so sorry_!”

Thomas is shocked, and more than a little concerned. “Roman, it’s – it’s okay. I’m not sure why I panicked either, it’s not like I actually believed you were gonna skewer me or whatever. You’re okay, I’m not mad. It’s _okay_ , Roman.” 

Roman sniffles, scrubbing at his eyes and smearing tears all over his face. Thomas wonders briefly if he looks this ugly when he cries. “Are you – are you sure? That was an intense panic I drove you into, and if I had known that would be the result I _never_ would have –”

“Roman, I believe you.” Thomas stands up, stretching his legs out before crossing the room and opening his arms.   
  
“What – what are you doing?” 

“I’m hugging you. Come here, Roman.”

“Wh-why are you –”

“Roman, come here and let me hug you,” Thomas says. Roman shuffles into his arms stiffly, but the second Thomas’s arms settle around his waist and shoulder he relaxes, hugging him back tightly. Hugging Roman is drastically different from hugging Patton – Roman is broad and muscular, and he smells kind of like a weird amalgamation of every scent Thomas has every found to be particularly attractive. Even though Thomas is ostensibly comforting Roman, he can’t help but feel _safe_ in his arms, as though nothing can touch him, as though he is protected from the world.

Roman’s arms are strong and warm, a heavy, comforting weight around him. “I’m sorry, Thomas,” Roman murmurs. “I would never harm you – and I would never harm Logan, either. Or Patton.”

“I believe you, Roman, don’t worry,” Thomas soothes.

Roman pulls away from the hug and turns back to Logan. “My . . . apologies, Logan. I suppose that what I did was . . . was not exactly the best course of action.” 

“It is fine,” Logan says, only slightly stiffly. Roman opens his arms for a hug, but Logan takes a step backward and extends his hand. Roman stares at it for a moment before shaking it. 

“Well, this has been a wonderful learning curve, but I need to eat food,” Thomas says. A thought occurs to him. “Do you guys . . . need to eat?”

“Need to eat? No, we don’t,” Logan says. 

“But we like to!” Patton adds. “And I can cook pretty darn well!” 

“I still do not know how that is possible, considering that Thomas’s cooking skills are . . .” Logan hesitates, like he doesn’t want to insult Thomas, before settling on, “mediocre at best.” He looks at Thomas quickly out of the corner of his eyes, like he’s worried that he’s insulted him. 

Thomas shrugs. “I mean . . . fair, Logan.” 

Patton nods excitedly. “I’ll make breakfast!” he says. “I can make scrambled eggs and pancakes and –” He keeps talking, listing off different breakfast foods, while Roman nods along in agreement and Logan quietly points out which options are infeasible. Thomas heads for the kitchen, figuring he should probably figure out what all he actually has in his fridge. 

He makes it to the top of the stairs before realizing that he cannot go any further. He tries to take the first step down the staircase, but it’s as though he’s slammed into some kind of wall – he can’t actually move. “Um, guys?”   
  
Patton steps into the hallway. “Yeah, kiddo?” The second that Patton’s foot crosses the threshold into the hallway, the hard barrier dissolves, and Thomas falls forward down the stairs. He hits another barrier before he gets very far, but then Patton is running down the hallway and the wall dissolves again and Thomas goes flying down the stairs.

He collapses into a tangled heap of limbs and bruises at the foot of the stairs. The breath is knocked clean out of his body, and it takes several seconds of gasping like a fish yanked out of water before he gets his breath back.

“ _Thomas!_ ” There are gentle hands on his shoulder now, helping to unfold him and lay him out flat on his back. “Thomas, what happened? Did you trip? Did you hit your head, are you okay?”

“I’m okay, Pat . . .” Thomas groans. He can still feel all his limbs, and he can feel his head – more accurately, he can feel the massive bruise forming on the back of it. “There . . . there was something that kept me from going down the stairs. I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t move past it.”  
  
“What? There wasn’t anything like that when I was on the stairs!” 

Thomas can hear the pounding of footsteps on the stairs as Roman and Logan come running. “Patton, what happened to Thomas? Is he okay?”

“ _Of course_ he’s not okay, Roman, he fell down the stairs!”

Before either of them can come to blows again, Thomas sits up, holding his head. “I’m okay, guys. I need an ice pack, but I . . . I think I’m okay.”

“You should get tested for a concussion,” Logan says worriedly.

“Is it really that bad?” Roman demands.

“I don’t know! But if it is, Thomas needs to go to the hospital.” Logan crouches in front of Thomas, holding a finger up in front of his face. “Thomas, follow my finger with your eyes, okay?” He moves his index finger slowly back and forth, and Thomas dutifully flicks his gaze left and right after it.

“Good, Thomas, that’s good. Now, I am going to ask a series of questions to test your cognitive faculties. Answer them to the best of your ability. Do you understand?” 

“Yes.”   
  
“What is your first name?”   
  
“Thomas.”   
  
“What is your last name?”

“Sanders.”

“Where are you right now?”

“I’m in my house . . .”  
  
“What is my name?”

“Logan.”

Logan pulls Thomas’s phone out of his pocket and shines the flashlight in his eyes. Thomas winces at the bright light in his eyes, but Logan seems satisfied. “Your pupils are dilating properly,” he hums. “I do not believe that you are concussed.”

“Wouldn’t we feel if Thomas was concussed?” Patton asks. “We felt when he went down the stairs.” This is when Thomas notices that Patton is rubbing the back of his head, exactly where Thomas can feel the throbbing pain of a bruise, and Logan is holding his left wrist as though is aches just like Thomas’s does, and Roman is wincing as he stretches his legs out.

“You guys felt that?”

“We didn’t know what was happening,” Patton says, “but we all felt a lot of pain in our arms and legs and head, so I wasn’t surprised when I saw that you had fallen down the stairs. I was concerned, sure, but not surprised.” 

Thomas reaches over and pinches Logan’s forearm. He doesn’t pinch hard enough to hurt, but he pinches hard enough for Logan to jump and let out a startled yelp. And just as he’d suspected, Patton and Roman both jump and yelp as well. Thomas himself shivers, feeling a pinch on his left forearm _exactly_ where he’d pinched Logan.

“Thomas!” Logan shrieks, scrambling away from him. “What was the purpose of that?”

“I felt that,” Thomas says.

“What?”

“When I pinched you, I felt my own arm pinch. In the _exact same place_ , Logan.” 

Logan’s face shifts from betrayed and pained to curious and eager in a _heartbeat_. “Really? So you would feel if I did this?” Without hesitation, he whirls around and socks Roman in the arm, a little harder than is perhaps strictly necessary. Roman shrieks and shoves Logan in retaliation; he falls onto his back with a soft _thump_. 

“Yep!” Thomas wheezes. “Felt both of those!” 

“ _Fascinating_ ,” Logan muses, not even bothering to sit up. “Whatever you feel, we feel, and whatever we feel, you feel?” 

“Well, yeah, why wouldn’t that be the case? You’re all parts of me, aren’t you?”

Logan starts muttering to himself, waving his hands absently in the air. Thomas sucks in a shaky breath as glowing blue lines appear in the wake of Logan’s fingers, forming themselves into words and numbers and weird, complicated-looking diagrams. “Uh . . . Logan?”

Logan, apparently, does not hear him. “ _Logan?_ ” he repeats. Logan looks up, blinking at him through one of the diagrams hovering in the air.   
  
“Yes, Thomas?”   
  
“What . . . what are those?”

“What? Oh, these? They happen all the time. They’re a literal representation of your thought process.”

“I thought _you_ were the literal representation of my thought process?!”   
  
“No, I’m the literal representation of your _ability_ to think. Confusing, I know, but different things nonetheless. They’re not strictly necessary, they just help me organize new information.” 

Logan blushes. “Plus, I . . . think they look kind of cool.”

“Nerd,” Roman mutters, but there’s a teasing smile on his face. It doesn’t stop Logan from lightly punching him in the arm again, but the force of the blow is significantly lighter.

“So!” Patton grins, clapping his hands together. “Pancakes?” 

**Author's Note:**

> come and scream at me on tumblr!! // [@teacupfulofbrains ](https://teacupfulofstarshine.tumblr.com)


End file.
